4 ms·

I'm not a millenial, but this quote sums up my attitude towards dating > “For an average date, you’re going to spend at least two hours, and in that two hours

I'm not a millenial, but this quote sums up my attitude towards dating > “For an average date, you’re going to spend at least two hours, and in that two hours I won’t be doing something I enjoy,”

niftich 10y ago
Don't dating sites, or merely texting for a while before a date mitigate some of that feeling? The parties involved can narrow down a range of activities that they'd like for a first date. In my circles, a normal first date is somewhere casual in public where you can sit for a while, like a Starbucks or Panera, or equivalent coffeehouse in countries where coffeehouses actually exist. First impressions matter insofar as 10 minutes into the date you start to get an idea whether you and the other person is truly on the same wavelength, and about 30 minutes in, you know for sure. If it's working, you're connecting with another person, and you can plan something more engaging for the next encounter, and if it didn't work, you're only out the price of a drink. Is it truly a common sentiment that dates are too bothersome to make them worthwhile?
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  >In my circles, a normal first date is somewhere casual in public where you can sit for a while, like a Starbucks or Panera, or equivalent coffeehouse in countries where coffeehouses actually exist. You mean like the US? If you're in any kind of decent city, there's plenty of nice coffee shops which aren't Starbucks. If the only coffee shops around are Starbucks, you're living in a shithole. I usually propose to meet at non-Starbucks coffee shops for my first dates too. It's nice because even if the date is a bust (as it always is...), I now know of a new coffee shop. >Is it truly a common sentiment that dates are too bothersome to make them worthwhile? I really don't know because I don't hang out with Millenials that young (that guy in the article was only 18 IIRC), but I kinda doubt it. I think that guy was just a freak. He talked about how he just likes to sit at home in front of his computer with 3 different screens showing 3 different things at once (video game, movie, other) and focus on making money. I really don't think that's normal, I think the article's author managed to find one of the weirdest people possible and then try to present him as representative of all younger Millenials.
  - niftich 10y ago
    > If the only coffee shops around are Starbucks, you're living in a shithole. I don't disagree, but in my opinion picking a very mainstream, arguably mass-market, but still decent place for a first date over the one-of-a-kind local shop is useful signalling. It makes it clear that you're not trying to impress by the choice of venue and you're not trying to project a particular lifestyle, and is a form of expectation management. I don't believe that the hardcore multitasker in the example, gaming but somehow still money-making, typifies the average millennial either, but since the population of non- sexually active millennials is a subset, perhaps he's less of an outlier in that group. At the risk of subjectively overgeneralizing in the other direction, perhaps that some of us perceive none of these anecdotes as very typical 'young people' behavior suggests that quirkier people have less sex than people whose behaviors and opinions wouldn't have stood out to us as much. Or we could just be too biased to what we think is 'normal' behavior. It's an intriguing point.
    - Grishnakh 10y ago
      >I don't disagree, but in my opinion picking a very mainstream, arguably mass-market, but still decent place for a first date over the one-of-a-kind local shop is useful signalling. I was mainly objecting to your line about "countries where coffeehouses actually exist." We have those in the US, they're all over the place. Just not in small towns or shitty (usually smaller and Southern) cities. Just open Google Maps, pick any metro area with at least 1M people, and search for "coffee". You should easily find something that's not Starbucks or Panera (though I will admit Panera is pretty good, it's my favorite corporate chain by far, but make sure to go to the corporate locations and not the franchises if you can). They aren't all one-of-a-kind local shops; there are plenty of local or regional chains around. I'll take any of those over Starbucks. But for your "useful signaling", that can be played different ways. Picking a Starbucks when there's better convenient alternatives, to me, says that you're possibly a mindless consumer drone who just buys whatever's popular without putting any thought into your consumption. Maybe I'm just biased, but from my own experience, Starbuck's product is generally sub-par, and their shops are generally too small and overcrowded compared to their competition. Not really the kind of place where you can sit down with someone and have a nice, quiet chat. Maybe they used to be years ago. You're probably right about quirkier people. Maybe the Millenials have a higher proportion of quirkier people than previous generations. The internet certainly can be blamed for that.
GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
I have to wonder what extremely limited set of activities that person enjoys.

niftich 10y ago

Don't dating sites, or merely texting for a while before a date mitigate some of that feeling? The parties involved can narrow down a range of activities that they'd like for a first date. In my circles, a normal first date is somewhere casual in public where you can sit for a while, like a Starbucks or Panera, or equivalent coffeehouse in countries where coffeehouses actually exist. First impressions matter insofar as 10 minutes into the date you start to get an idea whether you and the other person is truly on the same wavelength, and about 30 minutes in, you know for sure. If it's working, you're connecting with another person, and you can plan something more engaging for the next encounter, and if it didn't work, you're only out the price of a drink. Is it truly a common sentiment that dates are too bothersome to make them worthwhile?

Grishnakh 10y ago
>In my circles, a normal first date is somewhere casual in public where you can sit for a while, like a Starbucks or Panera, or equivalent coffeehouse in countries where coffeehouses actually exist. You mean like the US? If you're in any kind of decent city, there's plenty of nice coffee shops which aren't Starbucks. If the only coffee shops around are Starbucks, you're living in a shithole. I usually propose to meet at non-Starbucks coffee shops for my first dates too. It's nice because even if the date is a bust (as it always is...), I now know of a new coffee shop. >Is it truly a common sentiment that dates are too bothersome to make them worthwhile? I really don't know because I don't hang out with Millenials that young (that guy in the article was only 18 IIRC), but I kinda doubt it. I think that guy was just a freak. He talked about how he just likes to sit at home in front of his computer with 3 different screens showing 3 different things at once (video game, movie, other) and focus on making money. I really don't think that's normal, I think the article's author managed to find one of the weirdest people possible and then try to present him as representative of all younger Millenials.
- niftich 10y ago
  > If the only coffee shops around are Starbucks, you're living in a shithole. I don't disagree, but in my opinion picking a very mainstream, arguably mass-market, but still decent place for a first date over the one-of-a-kind local shop is useful signalling. It makes it clear that you're not trying to impress by the choice of venue and you're not trying to project a particular lifestyle, and is a form of expectation management. I don't believe that the hardcore multitasker in the example, gaming but somehow still money-making, typifies the average millennial either, but since the population of non- sexually active millennials is a subset, perhaps he's less of an outlier in that group. At the risk of subjectively overgeneralizing in the other direction, perhaps that some of us perceive none of these anecdotes as very typical 'young people' behavior suggests that quirkier people have less sex than people whose behaviors and opinions wouldn't have stood out to us as much. Or we could just be too biased to what we think is 'normal' behavior. It's an intriguing point.
  - Grishnakh 10y ago
    >I don't disagree, but in my opinion picking a very mainstream, arguably mass-market, but still decent place for a first date over the one-of-a-kind local shop is useful signalling. I was mainly objecting to your line about "countries where coffeehouses actually exist." We have those in the US, they're all over the place. Just not in small towns or shitty (usually smaller and Southern) cities. Just open Google Maps, pick any metro area with at least 1M people, and search for "coffee". You should easily find something that's not Starbucks or Panera (though I will admit Panera is pretty good, it's my favorite corporate chain by far, but make sure to go to the corporate locations and not the franchises if you can). They aren't all one-of-a-kind local shops; there are plenty of local or regional chains around. I'll take any of those over Starbucks. But for your "useful signaling", that can be played different ways. Picking a Starbucks when there's better convenient alternatives, to me, says that you're possibly a mindless consumer drone who just buys whatever's popular without putting any thought into your consumption. Maybe I'm just biased, but from my own experience, Starbuck's product is generally sub-par, and their shops are generally too small and overcrowded compared to their competition. Not really the kind of place where you can sit down with someone and have a nice, quiet chat. Maybe they used to be years ago. You're probably right about quirkier people. Maybe the Millenials have a higher proportion of quirkier people than previous generations. The internet certainly can be blamed for that.

GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago

I have to wonder what extremely limited set of activities that person enjoys.